My gift in the new silence
is the old silence. To see myself
in an armful of swords or the person beneath
who curls one hand as if to welcome the blessing.
All night I dream of the ones, who are even now walking and the pacing,
the gait, the slide, slippage from side to side,
the way the prow of a boat breaks into the water
or sunlight cuts glass. I know we are on the precipice.
I know the calling …
When they asked my daddy for id I showed them mine.
When we needed blades & generators to light the granite
Factory’s operations. I vouched my name for those rentals,
Dos esqueletos en un solo cuerpo
Buscan acomodar sus huesos
Y todos los golpes que les ubican
Sus caderas que menean solas
Dos esqueletos en un solo cuerpo
Un esqueleto …
There is strength in numbers, as shown
by the return of cyclamens, nodding
their purple heads along the path.
I try not to smash them, there are only
three patches of …
In the middle
of something. I exist:
barely and bulb-like.
An idea that is nothing
but mass. Before it’s been
given any thought,
but after its
conception …
Was it only the mild indecision
to postpone lunch and turn,
planning to catch our breath
just as Lake Michigan’s gilding
dulled to the shading of a moment—
unremarkable, transient, …
I find her seated at the kitchen table at two a.m.,
her red dress a large heart in the dark’s chest.
I flip the light switch: she stares past the …
Possumtown Neighborhood, Piscataway, NJ, one mile
from the Middlesex Sampling Plant site, where radiation
cleanup from ore sampling in the 1940’s was projected to be completed in 2000
My best friend …
The yard has been stripped, the hyacinths
along with the rose bushes, petals heavy of dew,
the basket of a child’s undershirt saddled with toys.
Perhaps for the best—Maa mi …
My mother calls about a new house
they might move to, there were legal issues,
but also a big lot.
Won’t the fires affect California
property values, I ask, also …
